1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the gene and a new fragment of the gene for the hemagglutinin neuraminidase (called the "HN" protein for short hereinbelow) of human parainfluenza Type 2 virus (called "PIV-2" for short hereinbelow) and materials containing said gene or fragment. More particularly, the present invention is concerned with a gene or fragment thereof which is complementary to the gene RNA for the PIV-2 HN protein and, furthermore, contains the entire coding areas for PIV-2 HN protein. The gene or fragment being useful as a test agent or a therapeutic agent for PIV-2 infections.
2. Background Information
For enhancing the therapeutic effect on virus infections, it is necessary to identify the infectious virus and to conduct adequate therapy on the basis of such identification.
Viruses have heretofore been identified on the basis of serological properties. Methods for such identification include those known as the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (called "ELISA" for short hereinbelow), the neutralization reaction, the complement fixation reaction, the hemagglutination inhibition reaction, the fluorescent antibody technique and the agar precipitation reaction. All of these involve an assay of the antibody to a given virus in the test material. In order to make an accurate determination the assay must be run at a stage at which the antibody titer for the virus begins to increase, generally a week after infection and, in some cases, a re-assay after several weeks is required. It is therefore a problem that diagnosis prior to onset of the symptoms caused by the infection or early diagnosis is hardly feasible.
For the determination of PIV-2 an ELISA is usually employed by which an antibody against PIV-2 in a test specimen is assayed, for example, by adding a test specimen to a plate on which PIV-2 has been fixed, allowing a reaction to proceed, washing the plate, further adding antiPIV 2 antibody to the plate, allowing a reaction to proceed, then adding the enzyme-labelled antibody to the reaction mixture, allowing a reaction to proceed and the problem as mentioned above, that is, a difficulty in presymptom and early diagnoses with a result that initiation of the treatment is necessarily delayed, so that enhancement of the therapeutic effect is difficult.
The present invention solves such problems and particularly provides a gene or a fragment of the gene useful in test agents, which make early diagnosis of PIV-2 infections possible.